ZHELEZNOVODSK, Russia (Reuters) – When an art gallery in southern Russia closed its doors to help curb the spread of the coronavirus, one artist asked to self-isolate there rather than leave his place of work. Sergei Pronin had only just started work as an adm... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – From a bunch of radishes to a sleeping cat, Parisian Agnes Goyet has turned to her life indoors for inspiration as France’s coronavirus lockdown frees her up to pursue her hobby – art. Goyet, who normally works as a real estate manager, is am... More »
(Reuters) – Lady Gaga, Taylor Swift, Paul McCartney, The Rolling Stones, Beyonce and Oprah Winfrey on Saturday headlined a special broadcast of music, comedy and personal stories celebrating those around the world on the frontlines of the coronavirus pandemic.... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – San Diego Comic-Con, an annual celebrity-studded showcase of superhero films and pop culture, has been canceled for the first time in its 50-year history due to the global coronavirus outbreak, organizers said on Friday. Comic-Con had b... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian life model Leigh Pitchford casually poses with a towel partly draped over his naked body, ready to be sketched by a group of art students in Sydney. Except, the class is empty, save for an art teacher and videographer. In an era o... More »
SANTIAGO (Reuters) – Astronomers in Chile using one of the world’s largest telescopes have found a star “dancing” around a black hole in the Milky Way just as Albert Einstein might have predicted more than a century ago. Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Street-artist Banksy has followed official advice to stay at home during the coronavirus crisis by creating a new artwork in his bathroom that shows his trademark stencilled rats running amok around the sink and toilet. The elusive artist po... More »
CAIRO (Reuters) – Wearing white face paint, stripy top and bright red spectacle frames, Ahmed Naser stands in a street in Cairo distributing face masks and health advice to passing children. The 22-year-old engineering student has been entertaining youngsters ... More »
KIEV (Reuters) – Ukrainian brothers Nikita and Egor Zigura work on their sculpture of a giant fingerprint as art enthusiasts look on via a live-streaming internet link and make bids for the developing work. The online auction is part of a new “Stay Art Home” s... More »
BOGOTA (Reuters) – Gerson Monje holds up his cellphone to proudly show off his online sex shop. A red banner reading “sold out!” is plastered across half of the products. While most Colombian businesses suffer during a five-week lockdown meant to curb the spre... More »
TOULOUSE, France (Reuters) – French space scientists are using the COVID-19 lockdown as a dry run for what it will be like to be cooped up inside a space craft on a mission to Mars. The guinea pigs in the experiment are 60 students who are confined to their do... More »
MADRID (Reuters) – Spaniards at the country’s main transport hubs were handed face masks on a rainy Monday morning as the government relaxed some of the tough lockdown measures designed to rein in the coronavirus health crisis which has claimed nearly 17,000 l... More »
SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korea reported on Monday that at least 116 people initially cleared of the new coronavirus had tested positive again, although officials suggested they would soon look at easing strict recommendations aimed at preventing new outbreaks. ... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – Some of Japan’s ubiquitous convenience stores have taken a novel approach to social distancing by hanging plastic sheets from the ceiling to provide a barrier between customers and staff at the cash register during the coronavirus pandemic. P... More »
CARACAS (Reuters) – Venezuelan Cardinal Baltazar Porras led Easter Mass on Sunday from an empty church, offering a sermon that was broadcast over Instagram to hundreds of people quarantined in their homes because of the coronavirus pandemic. Standing before 51... More »
BUDAPEST (Reuters) – Akos Vanek, a former triathlon World Cup winner, works as a paramedic these days in Budapest taking patients ill with COVID-19 to hospital as Hungary fights the coronavirus crisis. Vanek, who won the 2014 Triathlon World Cup, hung up his r... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Cooped up in the White House, President Donald Trump sees the coronavirus briefings as his main outlet of the day, a reminder for Americans that he is in charge of managing the greatest crisis of a lifetime. Plus, the ratings are good. S... More »
SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Singapore has suspended the use of video-conferencing tool Zoom by teachers after “very serious incidents” in the first week of a coronavirus lockdown that has seen schools move to home-based learning. One incident involved obscene images... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – Artist Paul McCartney’s handwritten lyrics to The Beatles’ hit song “Hey Jude” sold for $910,000 on Friday, nine times its original estimate, auction house Julien’s Auctions said. A vintage bass drumhead with The Beatles’ logo that was use... More »
CHIPPING CAMDEN, England (Reuters) – Costume makers in Britain who normally dress actors in shows from Downton Abbey to Game of Thrones and Batman have joined forces to make scrubs for medics fighting the coronavirus outbreak. Working from kitchens, sheds and ... More »
MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian ballet dancers on partial lockdown have begun giving performances at home to keep fans engaged online after theatres across the country closed their doors due to the coronavirus. Seven dancers from the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St. Pet... More »
MOSCOW (Reuters) – While making blinis one morning in self-isolation, Natalia Goroshko noticed one in her pan had taken the floppy form of one of Salvador Dali’s melting clocks. The 31-year-old Belarusian living in Texas placed three blinis in her kitchen to m... More »
HELSINKI (Reuters) – A quick-thinking Helsinki bakery has saved itself from financial ruin due to the new coronavirus pandemic by creating a cake that looks like a toilet roll. The dismayed staff at the Ronttosrouva bakery found all their orders cancelled last... More »
SARAJEVO (Reuters) – Bosnia’s most popular band, Dubioza Kolektiv, invites its audience to “stay connected and disinfected” during a weekly “Quarantine Show” online to cheer up fans locked in their homes due to the coronavirus. Bosnia, like most states in Euro... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – A powerful tropical cyclone made landfall on the South Pacific island nation of Vanuatu on Monday, witnesses said, levelling buildings in a country already in a state of emergency due to concerns about the coronavirus. Cyclone Harold approac... More »
MILAN (Reuters) – It took Silvia Bertuletti 11 days of frantic phone calls to persuade a doctor to visit her 78-year-old father Alessandro, who was gripped by fever and struggling for breath. When an on-call physician did go to her house near Bergamo, at the e... More »
(Reuters) – A tiger at the Bronx Zoo in New York City has tested positive for the respiratory disease caused by the novel coronavirus, in the first known case of a human infecting an animal and making it sick, the zoo’s chief veterinarian said on Sunday. Nadia... More »
SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korea reported fewer than 50 new coronavirus cases for the first time since its peak at the end of February as daily infections in Asia’s largest outbreak outside China continued to trend downward. The Korea Centers for Disease Control ... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – An auction of late actress Doris Day’s four Golden Globe awards and other items from her life generated nearly $3 million over the weekend, far outpacing original estimates, Julien’s Auctions said on Sunday. Top-selling items in the liv... More »
(Reuters) – Country music stars will come together on Sunday with acoustic performances recorded from their homes for a televised special that will replace the annual Academy of Country Music Awards, which were canceled due to the global coronavirus outbreak. ... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Walt Disney Co will release the live-action epic “Mulan” in movie theaters in July and Marvel’s “Black Widow” in November, the company said on Friday as it reshuffled a schedule disrupted by the global coronavirus outbreak. Among other ... More »
(Reuters) – At least two U.S. state attorneys have sought information from Zoom Video Communications Inc following multiple reports that questioned the privacy and security of the video-conferencing app. Zoom’s popularity has surged as employees at businesses,... More »
MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russia will send 11 military planes carrying medical equipment to Serbia to help it fight the coronavirus outbreak, the defence ministry in Moscow said on Friday. The announcement came a day after the Kremlin said Serbian President Aleksanda... More »
STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – A spike in novel coronavirus infections and deaths in Stockholm has raised questions about Sweden’s decision to fight the outbreak without resorting to the lockdowns that have left much of Europe at a standstill. Governments across Europe... More »
BEIJING/NEW YORK (Reuters) – Global cases of the new coronavirus have shot past 1 million with more than 53,000 fatalities, a Reuters tally showed on Friday, as death tolls soared in the United States and western Europe while the world economy nosedived. In th... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Dr. Deborah Birx, the coordinator of the White House task force on the coronavirus, had a message for Americans on Thursday: do better at social distancing. President Donald Trump didn’t like the message. At what has become a daily brief... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Fans of musical theatre forced by the coronavirus pandemic to stay at home will be able to watch some of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s most popular shows for free on Youtube every week. The series, entitled “The Shows Must Go On!”, will kick off on ... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Taylor Swift is sending cash to some of her fans and Rihanna has donated $6 million to support people whose livelihoods have been upended by the coronavirus pandemic. Movie and record producer David Geffen said he is self-isolating in t... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Public Enemy’s ouster last month of founding member Flavor Flav was a hoax to generate publicity and provide a commentary on disinformation, members of the rap group said on Wednesday as they released a new album. Founder Chuck D and fo... More »
DAKAR (Reuters) – The mural stretched over 10 metres of wall in Senegal’s seaside capital Dakar shows a giant pair of hands reaching out for sanitiser, and a woman in hoop earrings and a facemask colored blue, red, gold and green. It is the work of RBS CREW, a... More »
LAREN, Netherlands (Reuters) – Thieves stole a painting by Dutch master Vincent van Gogh early on Monday from the Netherlands’ Singer Laren Museum, which is currently closed to the public because of the coronavirus. The painting “Lentetuin”, or “Spring Garden,... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – A decision on a new date for Japan’s Olympics, postponed because of a coronavirus pandemic, could come as early as this week, the president of the Tokyo organizing committee, Yoshiro Mori, said on Monday. Last week’s postponement is a huge bl... More »
RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) – Brazilian rapper MV Bill added his voice to a chorus of criticism of President Jair Bolsonaro for downplaying the gravity of the new coronavirus epidemic in a video clip that urges people to protect themselves. His rap “Quarantine” r... More »
MOSCOW (Reuters) – Moscow’s famed Bolshoi Theater has begun streaming some of its most notable past performances online after being forced to shut its doors to the public as a result of tough new restrictions aimed at curbing the spread of the coronavirus. The... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – The stars of the movie “Contagion,” which has seen a surge in popularity as the coronavirus has spread across the globe, on Friday urged fans to listen to experts, wash their hands frequently and practice social distancing. “That was a ... More »
ROVANIEMI, Finland (Reuters) – When Peruvian musician Victor Alarcon set out on his dream trip to shoot a music video in the Finnish Arctic for his single called ‘Aurora Boreal’ (Northern Lights), he did not expect the coronavirus outbreak to leave him strande... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The U.S. Treasury secretary and the Senate Democratic leader voiced confidence late on Monday for a deal to be reached soon on a far-reaching coronavirus economic stimulus package that had been stalled in the U.S. Senate as lawmakers hag... More »
BOGOTA (Reuters) – Colombia’s central military hospital, which for decades was inundated with victims of landmines and other casualties of the country’s internal conflict, is being outfitted to battle a new enemy: coronavirus. The hospital’s staff parking lot ... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – With the coronavirus pandemic in the United States intensifying, Senate Democrats and Republicans will scramble on Monday to come to an agreement on a far-reaching $1 trillion-plus coronavirus stimulus package after a procedural vote to ... More »
TOKYO (Reuters) – Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe said for the first time on Monday that the Tokyo Olympic Games may need to be postponed if the event cannot be held in its “complete form” due to the coronavirus pandemic. The International Olympic Committee... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – The Cannes Film Festival, the world’s largest, was forced to postpone its latest edition in May due to the spread of the coronavirus, organisers of the annual event on the French Riviera said on Thursday. The postponement follows weeks of spe... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia is considering a second round of economic stimulus, three sources familiar with the deliberations told Reuters, as Canberra accelerated efforts to contain the spread of the coronavirus that has now killed five people in the country... More »
NEW YORK (Reuters) – The mayors of New York City and Los Angeles, the two largest cities in the United States, on Sunday said they were ordering restaurants, theaters, bars and movie houses closed in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus. Any restaur... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders blasted President Donald Trump’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak during Sunday’s Democratic debate, and offered competing visions for how they would lead in a time of crisis that has upended the daily li... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democratic presidential contenders Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders faced off on Sunday in their first one-on-one debate, a key moment before votes in four states on Tuesday that could give Biden an insurmountable lead in the party’s White H... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – Bans on mass gatherings introduced to slow the spread of the coronavirus pandemic might have been expected to deal a death blow to musical life, but have instead prompted a boom in free online concerts. One musician to step up to the plate i... More »
JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Muslims gathered in smaller-than-usual numbers at al-Aqsa mosque in Jerusalem on Friday after religious authorities decided to keep Islam’s third holiest site open for prayers but enact health measures to prevent the spread of the coronav... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – A series of six paintings by the Venetian master Titian, commissioned by King Philip II of Spain and inspired by the works of the Roman poet Ovid, have been reunited for the first time in four centuries in an exhibition at London’s National ... More »
HAVANA (Reuters) – Dozens of renowned Cuban artists from across the political spectrum are calling for the release of dissident artist and activist Luis Manuel Otero Alcantara who was arrested 10 days ago, decrying this as an outdated act of censorship. The 32... More »
HARARE (Reuters) – When Dominic Benhura started creating traditional Zimbabwean stone sculptures as a teenager four decades ago, he never imagined that art would bring him fame or fortune. Born to a peasant family in 1968 in Murewa, 90 kilometers northeast of ... More »
ROME (Reuters) – An exhibition commemorating the 500th anniversary of the death of Renaissance artist Raphael opens in Rome this week but the show risks being overshadowed by the coronavirus outbreak sweeping Italy. The Scuderie del Quirinale gallery has sold ... More »
MOGADISHU (Reuters) – The growls from the caged hyena reverberate through the room as Mohamed Sheikh Yakub slumps silently in a chair nearby, hoping the animal will frighten away the evil spirits he says have troubled him since his divorce. The traditional tre... More »
SEOUL/GAPYEONG, South Korea (Reuters) – The founder of the church at the center of South Korea’s coronavirus outbreak apologized on Monday after one of its members tested positive for the virus and infected many others, calling the epidemic a “great calamity”.... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia’s chief medical officer said on Monday it was no longer possible to completely prevent people with the coronavirus from entering the country, citing concerns about outbreaks in Japan and South Korea. Australia, one of the first cou... More »
BERLIN (Reuters) – A drama film shot in secret to evade government censorship that highlights the moral dilemmas faced by those caught in the web of Iran’s capital punishment machine won the Berlin Film Festival’s Golden Bear award on Saturday. “There Is No Ev... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – Roman Polanski’s film “An Officer and a Spy” collected its first Cesar Award out of 12 nominations on Friday, scooping the prize for best costume designer. Pascaline Chavanne was not at the event to collect her trophy after the entire cast an... More »
GHENT, Belgium (Reuters) – Belgian waffles may be about to become more environmentally friendly. Scientists at Ghent University in Belgium are experimenting with larva fat to replace butter in waffles, cakes and cookies, saying using grease from insects is mor... More »
CHARLESTON, S.C. (Reuters) – Democratic presidential hopeful Michael Bloomberg on Monday clashed with front-runner Bernie Sanders over vandalism at Bloomberg’s Chicago office and their gun control stances, while centrist rival Pete Buttigieg was heckled at a l... More »
(Reuters) – Katherine Johnson, the black woman whose mathematical genius took her from a behind-the-scenes job in a segregated NASA as portrayed in the film “Hidden Figures” to a key role in sending humans to the moon, died on Monday at the age of 101, NASA sa... More »
BEIJING/SEOUL (Reuters) – Fears of a coronavirus pandemic grew on Monday after sharp rises in new cases reported in Iran, Italy and South Korea but China relaxed restrictions on movements in several places including Beijing as its rates of new infections eased... More »
NEW DELHI/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – U.S. President Donald Trump will be accorded the biggest public reception given to any foreign leader in years during his visit to India beginning on Monday, officials say, one that could help paper over the two countries’ grow... More »
(Reuters) – Patrick Reed’s week began on a sour note with Brooks Koepka stoking the embers of a cheating allegation against him but the Texan ended it in a blaze of glory with victory at the WGC-Mexico Championship on Sunday. Reed may never be able to fully re... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A U.S. federal judge on Sunday denied a request by Roger Stone’s lawyers that she be removed from the case in which she last week sentenced the long-time adviser to President Donald Trump to three years and four months in prison. U.S. Di... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – “Mad Mike” Hughes, a self-styled explorer and daredevil bent on proving that the earth is flat was killed over the weekend when his homemade rocket crashed in the California desert over the weekend. “Michael ‘Mad Mike’ Hughes tragically... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – A French street artist’s interpretation of the Mona Lisa made of 330 Rubik’s Cubes sold for 480,200 euros ($520,680) on Sunday at a modern art auction in Paris, well above presale estimates of up to 150,000 euros, organizers Artcurial said. T... More »
RIYADH (Reuters) – Failure to reach a global deal on where and how much to tax digital giants such as Google (GOOGL.O), Amazon (AMZN.O) or Facebook (FB.O) would result in many digital tax regimes emerging all over the world, France’s Finance Minister said on S... More »
ATHENS (Reuters) – Greece distanced itself on Wednesday from suggestions that it planned to drag a centuries-old dispute over the return of the Parthenon marbles into Brexit negotiations. Government spokesman Stelios Petsas said Athens would keep up its campai... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A Neanderthal skeleton unearthed in an Iraqi cave already famous for fossils of these extinct cousins of our species is providing fresh evidence that they buried their dead – and intriguing clues that flowers may have been used in such r... More »
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) – Malaysia’s own security standards will dictate which companies take part in its planned 5G rollout this year, its communications minister told Reuters on Monday, as the United States pushes countries to exclude China’s Huawei [HWT.UL].... More »
SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australia will evacuate more than 200 of its citizens onboard a coronavirus-stricken cruise ship being held under quarantine in the Japanese port of Yokohama, Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Monday. Morrison said the passengers will de... More »
SIHANOUKVILLE, Cambodia (Reuters) – An influx of Chinese that some Cambodians resented for bringing noise, dust and chaos to the port of Sihanoukville, is the cause of more pain now that it has gone into reverse. The new coronavirus has meant yet another setba... More »
NAKHON RATCHASIMA, Thailand (Reuters) – Mourners left flowers and written messages in front of the Terminal 21 shopping center in northeastern Thailand on Monday after a soldier’s shooting rampage in which at least 29 people were killed. Soldiers, mall staff a... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – “Parasite,” a dark social satire from South Korea, won the Oscar for best picture on Sunday, making history as the first film in a language other than English to claim the movie industry’s highest honor. “Parasite,” about the gap betwee... More »
SEOUL (Reuters) – South Korean social media erupted in celebration on Monday after the dark comedy “Parasite” became the first non-English language movie to win the Best Picture award, already having netted three other Oscars in a historic first for the countr... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – “American Factory,” a Netflix film from Barack and Michelle Obama’s nascent production house chronicling what happened to a group of Ohio autoworkers laid off during the 2008 recession, won the Oscar for best documentary feature on Sund... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – South Korean Bong Joon Ho won the best director Oscar for dark social satire “Parasite” on Sunday, becoming the first person from the Asian nation to win the award. The film was one of the biggest winners at the Academy Awards, having a... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Joaquin Phoenix won his first Oscar on Sunday for his terrifying performance as an isolated loner who becomes one of the world’s best known comic book villains in “Joker,” and invoked his late brother River Phoenix in one of the most em... More »
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Renee Zellweger was crowned best actress at the Oscars on Sunday for her portrait of Hollywood legend Judy Garland in “Judy,” a biographical drama exploring the singer’s personal and professional turmoil at the end of her life. It marke... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A new probe built by NASA and the European Space Agency set off on a blazing hot journey to the sun on Sunday to take the first close-up look at the star’s polar regions, a mission expected to yield insight into how solar radiant energy ... More »
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – A new spacecraft built jointly by U.S. and European space agencies is ready for a blazing journey to the sun to capture an unprecedented view of its two poles, an angle that could help researchers understand how the star’s vast bubble of... More »
KAJIADO, Kenya (Reuters) – Two life-size lions crafted from scrap metal guard the entrance to the studio of Kenyan metal sculptor Kioko Mwitiki. Nearby a leopard, with holes in its metal body to mimic spots, crouches next to a giant elephant sculpture. Mwitiki... More »
PARIS (Reuters) – An image of the Mona Lisa made of 330 Rubik’s Cubes is going on sale in Paris, just down the road from Leonardo da Vinci’s original. The 2005 work by French urban artist Invader is expected to fetch up to 150,000 euros ($165,000) at the moder... More »
BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – The economic and diplomatic costs of China’s coronavirus epidemic mounted on Monday with investors knocking $400 billion off the value of stocks and the government accusing the United States of over-reacting to the outbreak and whi... More »
HONG KONG (Reuters) – Hundreds of medical workers went on strike in Hong Kong on Monday to demand the government shuts the border with mainland China to prevent the spread of a coronavirus and ease pressure on a stretched health sector. The Hospital Authority ... More »
BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Chinese stock and commodity markets fell heavily on Monday as the death toll from a coronavirus epidemic in China rose to 361 and investors retreated into safe-haven assets in the first trading session after an extended Lunar New Y... More »
DUBLIN (Reuters) – Nine years after a devastating crash in property prices catapulted the party of Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar to power, a housing market recovery too rapid for many threatens to dump it into opposition at this week’s general election. Th... More »
LONDON (Reuters) – Tamara de Lempicka’s “Portrait de Marjorie Ferry” is expected to fetch up to 12 million pounds ($16 million) when it comes up for auction in London next week. The painting was commissioned in 1932 by the husband of British-born cabaret star ... More »
ATHENS (Reuters) – Greece will step up its campaign for the return of the Parthenon Marbles from Britain and expects to win more support from European peers as Brexit sees British influence wane, the Greek culture minister said. Since independence in 1832, Gre... More »
PLOVDIV, Bulgaria (Reuters) – Stamen Karamfilov bends low over a canvas, adding the finishing touches to a woodland landscape – no mean feat considering the Bulgarian artist is almost totally blind. He initially gave up all hope of painting again when he sudde... More »
BEIJING (Reuters) – Macau said on Monday it will deny entry to visitors from China’s Hubei province or those who visited the province 14 days prior to arrival unless they can provide documentation showing they are not infected with the virus that broke out in ... More »
